Movies -- Transformers

I know a lot of us dreaded the coming of the Michael Bay version of Transformers. We clung to our memories of the 1980s animated series, no matter how well it may or may not hold up today (and in truth, a lot of it probably does).

There is one scene that will make you cringe at its silliness. Still, those existed from time to time in the animated series too. Other than that, this movie actually manages to mature the setting, including the implications of these giant robots' existence in this world that tended to be absent from the animations, and it actually has a reason its human characters are involved (if a bit of a stretch). Some of the Decepticon names are wrong too, sure (for example, Devastator is a tank instead of an amalgam of the six Constructicons), but it's they still do well with it. The robots characterization comes straight from the familiar blurbs on the toys, when it exists at all (Jazz is a hip-hop speaker, Ironhide is a bit abraisive and Prime is noble; on the other hand, Bumblebee and Rachet really don't get much chance to show personality).

In fact, Bumblebee not showing personality is rather sad, given that he's in most of the movie. He spends most of it needing to communicate in radio spots, television snippets, and songs, reminding me of the Junkions from the original movie. I don't really remember much of his original personality, so I can't really elaborate there.

The effects are top notch. You'll really believe a semi can turn into a thirty-foot robot.

It's worth a matinee viewing. Besides, it blows stuff up real good.

General Administrativaramastuff

Sorry I've been away from this for so long; things have been rather busy in real life.

I'm working on what will eventually be an urban fantasy superhero novel (although lots of people seem to want it to be a game setting, so I'll likely do that too). I don't know that I'll actually do anything with it once I'm done. Maybe I'll podcast it. Maybe not. I'm actually starting over on it, after mainlining most of the available episodes of Mike Stackpole's The Secrets podcast. I've had a rather bad habit of editing as I write, and there are a lot of other things I've picked up that I think will help me a lot. Among other things, I've outlined the thing, and maybe I can get something decent out of it.

Seriously, though, if you fancy yourself a writer, you need to check out The Secrets.

I still need to put together a basic game system to present to the Steam-Powered Magical Axe Group. More on this as it advances, or listen to the various podcasts I'm part of; I probably mention it there.

Finally, there is work, where I've had to catch up on a lot after vacation, leaving me rather beat when I get home.

Look for more regular postings in the future, though. Tomorrow, I'm probably going out to see Transformers, and if I have time before the AGC recording, I'll post about it.